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Judgment Days: Civil Rights Era of 1960s

In Judgment Days: Lyndon Baines Johnson, Martin Luther King Jr., and the Laws That Changed America Nick Kotz provides a fascinating account of the turbulent Civil Rights era of the 1960s, focusing on the relationship between President Lyndon Baines Johnson and Martin Luther King, Jr. Using newly available telephone conversations, FBI wiretaps, nearly 200 interviews and other resources, Kotz provides an account of how King, the moralist, and Johnson, the wily politician, successfully pushed the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and 1968 and the 1965 Voting Rights Act through a reluctant Congress. However, KotzÆ main contention is that JohnsonÆs reputation among the American public is largely viewed as one of an ôaverageö president. In fact nothing could be further from the truth. KotzÆ work demonstrates that with respect to Civil Rights, the normal roles associated with King (the moralist) and Johnson (the wily and self-serving politician) were reversed. Though unlikely partners, Kotz (Front Matter) maintains Johnson and King ôcame to work together in a political pas de deux of immense complexity and fragility to produce the most dramatic social change since the Emancipation Proclamation.ö Far from an average President, JohnsonÆs achievements make him a near-great President whose ultimate greatness was undermined by an American public unwilling to go too far and too fast on Civil Rights and the costly quagmire of the Vietnam War. This analysis will demonstrate that, in light of KotzÆ revelations, Johnson was a near-great president whose achievements need to be more widely celebrated.

In his ôGreat Societyö platform, President Johnson intended to ôout-Roosevelt Rooseveltö and ôout-Lincoln Lincolnö (Kotz 89). An ambitious series of reforms that included medical care, education, the environment, immigration, support of arts and humanities and other aspects of society, JohnsonÆs ôGreat Societyö would be undermined by the...

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Judgment Days: Civil Rights Era of 1960s. (1969, December 31). In LotsofEssays.com. Retrieved 09:19, March 29, 2024, from https://www.lotsofessays.com/viewpaper/1710967.html